Service delivery (old)

User involvement and accountability

There is a general consensus that improving user involvement and increasing the accountability of service providers to their clients is a good way to improve service delivery outcomes. But what is the best way to involve users in the design, monitoring and evaluation of services? What are the barriers to participation, particularly amongst the poorest?

User involvement and voice

Recent research argues that community participation in service delivery significantly enhances the responsiveness and accountability of service providers to users. However, communities should not be thought of as homogenous, as power hierarchies exist in all communities, meaning that some groups do not have the ability to voice their views. How can service provision be designed and delivered in a way that ensures the opinions of the users, socially excluded groups and the voices of the poor are heard and represented? Client voice is affected by various factors, including social status, education and geographical position. Citizens need to be more involved in service delivery, but getting their voices heard can be constrained by low awareness of rights, government resistance, poor access to information and complex laws and procedures for involvement in local decision-making. It is important to recognise that the poor face particular barriers to participation, for example, illiteracy, lack of time and an inability to travel long distances.

Mechanisms for user involvement

There are various mechanisms designed to improve participation and accountability of services, for example user groups and committees. But what makes a mechanism successful? What are the incentives to encourage a user to engage? Often these mechanisms suffer from poor credibility and elite capture. Research has revealed that despite their aims, they can become politicised, with undemocratic and non-inclusive practices and limited powers. In some instances, efforts to improve accountability may increase inequalities between organised groups from better off areas and the urban poor.

Understanding rights and entitlements

Often, people who do not have access to basic services are not able to demand better service from providers. This can be as a direct result of their lack of services, for example because they are illiterate, under-educated or unwell. Providing information is the first step to improving accountability amongst excluded groups – information helps people to understand the services they are entitled to, and the mechanisms available to them to demand this level of service.

Accountability

Accountability failures are a key cause of weak service delivery. Accountability is needed between policy-makers, service providers and service users, with the key relationship being direct accountability between providers and users. In developing countries this accountability relationship is often missing. Traditionally accountability mechanisms have been divided into ‘vertical’, where external systems are used by non-state actors to hold the state to account, or ‘horizontal’, where internal checks and balances are in operation. New types of accountability are now emerging which tend to be more informal and utilise new sites of engagement, for example online complaints forums.

Sundet, G., 2008, ‘Following the Money: Do Public Expenditure Tracking Surveys Matter?’, Chr. Michelsen Institute, U4 Issue, No. 8Expenditure tracking, or ‘follow the money’, has become a byword in development circles for interventions that look into whether the money gets to where it is supposed to be going. The best known ‘follow the money’ initiative is the Public Expenditure Tracking Survey (PETS) methodology that was developed in Uganda in the 1990s. The Uganda PETS found that 80% of the funds intended for primary schools were diverted on the way. This large ‘leakage’ was subsequently cut to only 20%, an improvement that was attributed to a public information campaign that was initiated after the publication of the first PETS. This U4 Issues Paper reviews the evidence concerning the efficacy of expenditure tracking, recommending closer attention to the political context of the various methods of expenditure tracking and budget monitoring. Access full text: available online